1. Technical Field
The embodiments herein generally relate to medical devices, and, more particularly, to occipital plate implant assemblies.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are many occipital plate implants on the market today. Some implants have through-holes and must be preloaded on the rod. Others have top loading sockets similar to polyaxial screws which allow bent rods to be anchored to the plate. The most simple, but generally most difficult, to use form is that of a rod that smoothly tapers to an occipital plate that must be bent and contoured to match highly varied anatomy. All of these iterations have at most one to two degrees of freedom and typically require long preparation time to ensure a proper bend. This makes the implants both difficult to connect to the longitudinal rod member and the occipital plateau without putting stress on the atlantoaxial joint. Accordingly, there remains a need for a new medical device that is a capable of connecting to the longitudinal members of a cervico-thoracic spinal fusion construct to an occipital plate providing improved ease of use.